ESCAPE

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No 'Garden Of Eden,' Utopias are not to be found, but you could choose to ESCAPE the 'rat race' in favor of an alternative lifestyle. Whether this is an attractive day-dream or a contemplated possibility, this topic is too alluring not to consider.

Discussion Forum

What if? What if you could escape your 'ho hum' life and travel in time? Travel to some distant galaxy, into the future, or go back in time to experience what it was like to live in some past era in…Continue

Jonathan Franzen: Great American NovelistBy Lev Grossman Thursday, Aug. 12, 2010Time I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that I never heard of this author before, but apparently his previous novel, The…Continue

***'ESCAPIST' Books*** Please contribute to this discussion by posting any interesting and relevant books that you have read or come across that would elicit excitement and interest to our dreams and…Continue

No Money Man: The thrifty adventures of Mark BoyleMark Boyle lives the good life and does it without spending a nickel (or in his case, a shilling).Mark Boyle outside his off-grid caravan.Mark Boyle…Continue

This is a rather long but extremely readable and interesting article. Reading it felt as though I was traveling back in time, because when I hitch-hiked to San Francisco from NY when I was 17, I met…Continue

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They said it couldn't be done. When we first wrote about the almost invisible tree house to be built in Sweden by Tham & Videgard, 899 commenters thought it was computer-generated eye candy, impossible to build, and death for birds.

But the architects built it, one of six units in a "Treehotel," which recently opened 40 miles south of the Arctic Circle in Sweden.

Just because a McMansion is "green" doesn't mean it is actually environmentally sustainable. Joachim is suggesting that building McMansions this way will reduce our consumption of resources. Yes, it will, but we should recognize that even an eco-friendly house located in suburban sprawl and auto-centric development will still consume vast amounts of resources. Joachim's idea is impressive, but he envisions its implementation in suburbs rather than in cities or compact neighborhoods. This sprawl eats up our land, prevents water from replenishing the water table via runoff on pavement, and requires people to drive everywhere they need to go and use gasoline excessively. If we really want to make a huge impact in solving the climate crisis, fixing sprawl is the avenue to do it. Ellen Dunham-Jones, in her very recent talk, demonstrated how it's possible.

Allen, that's exactly the way I felt about when reading about this Eco Village. Growing up in the seventies and having tried out a couple of communes, the 'spiritual' side of them always made me very uncomfortable. Couldn't do it way back then, and I'm certainly much less tolerant of that now.

Spent way to much time on the Dancing Rabbit web site. My only problem is they seem to "touchy-feely". I don't like group circles where everyone says/chants something. Reminds me too much of church. Too much of the counter-culture escapist hippie commune movements seem to me to be substituting new-age superstition for religion. Being an atheist I think I would have a great deal of trouble fitting in.

The Earthships were interesting. I read your article and spent way to much time on their web site. The only problem I have with them is the amount of materials necessary to make what amounts to a LARGE house (translating into lots of MONEY) for most people in the community. This community does not seem to be similar to the Small House community at all which overall would seem to have a much more benign ecological footprint???